If the Glendale City Council, by raising penalties, can protect certain tree species from tree-butchers, the Glendale City Council, by raising penalties, can protect citizens from motorized people-butchers.

STEVE FOSTER

Glendale

Good letter, Steve! In addition to more severe penalties for dangerous driving, implementing leading pedestrian intervals along Brand Boulevard north of Colorado would go a long way towards making pedestrians safer downtown.

On Friday, I was nearly run over twice. The first encounter was with a woman inattentively driving down Maryland at a high rate of speed. Maryland has two pedestrian crosswalks, but they are poorly marked (by elevated signs in the median and two shades of earth-tone bricks[!]) and drivers frequently don't notice them. In this case, I was in the pedestrian crossing, saw a RAV4 squeal around the corner of Wilson/Maryland and accelerate towards me, and I literally had to wave my hands wildly (while preparing to dive out of the way) to get this idiotic woman to stop.

The second encounter on Friday was a few minutes later at Wilson and Brand, when a very young driver making a right onto Brand from Wilson decided to stomp on the gas as soon as the light turned green, and nearly ran over 5 pedestrians (including me) who had the right of way to cross Brand. The second situation is exactly the type of dangerous conflict that leading pedestrian intervals are designed to eliminate.